Happy 99th birthday Maine Road

Gary James said:
Yes - I was stood on Kippax from 1983 (after sitting in PL & North Stand with parents from being a baby) and it was exactly as you say. You could feel how packed (or not) the Kippax was and see the 3 seated stands. So when people were sat in the aisles of the Main Stand & North Stand and the Kippax was packed to a level I’d never experienced before for the Charlton 85 game it was so obvious the attendance was closer to 58000 than the 48000 Swales & Halford claimed.
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Not being difficult Gary but was the capacity at the time not 52,500 and the Platt Lane end was pretty empty and the corner of the Kippax adjacent to the Platt Lane Stand was not even opened? It seems a push to suggest an additional 10 thousand people were in the ground.

Also its often an inference, if there was differences in recorded attendances and actual attendances the club was responsible. Did you ever interview anyone who worked at the club who supported this theory because I would imagine turnstile operators could easily have turned a blind eye for a few extra quid.
 
Gary James said:
There’s a few myths out there about where the name Maine Rd came from, so I’ve posted a free article on the latest research. It may be of interest:
gjfootballarchive.com

Maine Road’s Name

On this day (25 August) in 1923 Manchester City’s Maine Road Stadium opened. In 2003 I wrote “Farewell To Maine Road” and at that time I revealed that the actual street Maine Road had origina…
gjfootballarchive.com gjfootballarchive.com

Cheers (relevant when you look at the reason the name was chosen!).
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Good to see the Temperance movement didn’t win out ;-)
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
Very interesting. I did a quick search of the British Newspaper Archive and found an advert from The Manchester Evening News, Saturday 6th July 1878 which is the earliest reference I can find to Maine Road on that site ...

GREENHEYS. Splendid HOUSES TO BE LET in Ridgway-street, Maine Road and Upper Lloyd-street: rent from 6s 6d per week : convenient for bus Apply to Mr Noble on premises.


EDIT:

In a reference to Dog Kennel Lane from The Athletic News, 27th Sept 1882, there's a small piece about Mr A N Hornby, as president of the Manchester Association Football Club, late Manchester Wanderers, looking for soccer players to practice "hard on the ground in Dog-Kennel lane, Greenheys".

I wonder where that was.

Mr A N Hornby was an all-round sportsman ...

Lancashire Cricket Club

Official site for Lancashire Cricket Club includes fixtures, news, tickets, memberships and more.
cricketarchive.com cricketarchive.com

Captain of England when the Aussies beat us for the first time to start "the Ashes".
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i cover Hornby and both Manchester Wanderers and Manchester AFC in my book The Emergence of Footballing Cultures: Manchester 1840-1919. The ground on DKL isn’t the same one as Maine Rd sadly but I do mention it in the book. Cheers
 
franksinatra said:
Not being difficult Gary but was the capacity at the time not 52,500 and the Platt Lane end was pretty empty and the corner of the Kippax adjacent to the Platt Lane Stand was not even opened? It seems a push to suggest an additional 10 thousand people were in the ground.

Also its often an inference, if there was differences in recorded attendances and actual attendances the club was responsible. Did you ever interview anyone who worked at the club who supported this theory because I would imagine turnstile operators could easily have turned a blind eye for a few extra quid.
Click to expand...
The corner between PL & Kippax was away fans but the Platt Lane Stand was still home fans at this time and full. The PL became away fans only from summer 1985 after this game.

On attendance ‘differences’ - people sneaked in/doubled up; operators deliberately fixed turnstiles (I spent an insightful day with ’Turnstile Ted’ Pearson from Ellisons who pointed out at Maine Rd’s final season the fiddles he could tell were being made by turnstile operators); and there are serious question marks over officials & figures they reported (staff at the time have chatted to me and I know people who were working there who have often talked of things they saw).
 
Gary James said:
The corner between PL & Kippax was away fans but the Platt Lane Stand was still home fans at this time and full. The PL became away fans only from summer 1985 after this game.

On attendance ‘differences’ - people sneaked in/doubled up; operators deliberately fixed turnstiles (I spent an insightful day with ’Turnstile Ted’ Pearson from Ellisons who pointed out at Maine Rd’s final season the fiddles he could tell were being made by turnstile operators); and there are serious question marks over officials & figures they reported (staff at the time have chatted to me and I know people who were working there who have often talked of things they saw).
Click to expand...

Hi Gary, thank you very much for the response. I did watch the video back and you are quite correct about the Platt Lane, sadly I was getting my Charlton’s mixed up with my Bournemouth’s. Thanks again for the info.
 
Gary James said:
The corner between PL & Kippax was away fans but the Platt Lane Stand was still home fans at this time and full. The PL became away fans only from summer 1985 after this game.

On attendance ‘differences’ - people sneaked in/doubled up; operators deliberately fixed turnstiles (I spent an insightful day with ’Turnstile Ted’ Pearson from Ellisons who pointed out at Maine Rd’s final season the fiddles he could tell were being made by turnstile operators); and there are serious question marks over officials & figures they reported (staff at the time have chatted to me and I know people who were working there who have often talked of things they saw).
Click to expand...
I think people who went to most home games around that time Knew there was something odd going on with "official" attendances, I was at the charlton game with a few mates & it certainly felt like there were a lot more in the stadium that day than the figure given by the club
 
Citizen of Legoland said:
In a reference to Dog Kennel Lane from The Athletic News, 27th Sept 1882, there's a small piece about Mr A N Hornby, as president of the Manchester Association Football Club.

Mr A N Hornby was an all-round sportsman ...

Lancashire Cricket Club

Official site for Lancashire Cricket Club includes fixtures, news, tickets, memberships and more.
cricketarchive.com cricketarchive.com

Captain of England when the Aussies beat us for the first time to start "the Ashes".
Click to expand...
Is that the same Hornby mentioned in the old poem "Oh my Hornby and my Barlow long ago" which used to be on a plaque at L.C.C.C?
 
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